Sans Fig Leaf
"My Spectrum"
29 December, 2000
I have a confession to make.
I don't get the holiday blues.
I don't get bummed out thinking about how much fun other people are having. I'm one of the other people having the all the fun. Don't get me wrong, I'm not the kind of person who tries to force other people to cheer up. I just refuse not to be cheerful just because someone I'm around isn't.
And I don't let people pass around that old myth about suicide and the holidays. I inform them that it's a myth. Suicide rates go down, not up, from Thanksgiving through the end of the year. The one exception is New Year's Day. There are more suicides on New Year's Day than any other day of the year.
I understand why people believe the myth. Holidays are stressful times, even for cheerful kooks such as myself. Most everyone feels stressed and exhausted throughout. It is easy to assume that someone who is depressed all of the time would be even more depressed during the holidays.
But that's not the way it works. I lived with someone who had clinical depression for over seven years. It's not just exhaustion or moodiness. It's something much deeper than that, and a little thing like a holiday is nothing compared to what the chemicals in the brain are doing from one day to the next. The holiday blues that many people suffer from aren't the same thing as clinical depression. Just as an ordinary bad mood isn't the same thing as psychosis.
Some times I feel guilty that I don't get the holiday blues.
I don't get the blues very often about anything. Yes, things upset me or disappoint me, but few things make me sulk and cry out, "Oh, why me?"
One of the toughest lessons I've ever had to learn was that I can't fix other people's problems. I can't make them happy. I can't force them to stop being self-destructive. All I can do is be supportive, encouraging, and understanding.
I was thinking about that a lot over the holidays. Some of my relatives are in bad situations. Most of the situations can be improved, if not solved all together. But each person has to do it on their own. No matter how angry or worried I may be about the situations they've placed themselves in, or the situation they're putting their children in, I can't fix it.
And that makes me cross.
Sometimes I wonder if I'm really just minding my own business, or am I being a coward?
Should I tell my cousin that I don't care how many anger management classes her husband has been to, I think he'll abuse her again, and one of those times she won't survive it? If I said it out loud, other members of the family would accuse me of being unforgiving, or unsupportive of their new, improved relationship.
So do I keep quiet because I know she's been told these things by others, far more experienced about this than I, and she's chosen to ignore it? Or am I just afraid of making other members of the family angry?
On the other hand, if I said something, would I be doing it because I believe it, or because I wanted to be able to say, "I told you so" later?
Christmas trees always make me nostalgic.
When I'm nostalgic I get the urge to tell stories about the things I'm remembering. I worry sometimes that I bore my friends and loved ones to tears, telling the stories over and over again. Julie once told me that she liked hearing my stories, even though she'd already heard them. Ray said the same thing. I know I'm supposed to believe them, but I can't help wondering if they really meant it, or was it something they felt obligated to say?
I suspect it doesn't matter, because I don't think I could change that personality quirk. At the core of my being I'm a story-teller and always will be.
Holidays bring many of the paradoxes of life to light.
We are expected to travel great distances to spend the most important days of the year with people with whom we sometimes have little in common. We are expected to pretend that we really like something hideous we've been given, thus guaranteeing that we will get something even less appropriate next time.
We're expected to be in a dozen places at once, sharing genuine love and appreciation with scores of people in all of those places over a very short period of time. If you are married or otherwise partnered, you have at least two extended families wanting some of your time and attention.
And it can get a lot worse than that. Many of the relatives on my mom's side live here in Washington state. But most of my dad's side live back in Colorado. Michael's family is split between Missouri and Oklahoma. Ray's family is here in Seattle, but a couple hundred miles from where my family gets together for the holidays. Then there are my ex-in-laws who I wouldn't mind seeing for part of the holidays.
Which doesn't even get into the friends, all of whom I would rather see than some of the relatives I did see.
When looked at that way, it's easy to see why people are so emotionally taxed by the holidays. How could anyone fail to be overwhelmed? Oh, I know that there are worse situations: people who aren't welcome with their families at all, people who have no one to spend the holidays (or sometimes any time) with. It's all so very sad.
But I don't seem capable of remaining uncheerful for long. Maybe its a weird chemical imbalance in my head, but life is just too good. I just walked outside in a slight drizzle, and thought how pretty the world is when they clouds and the early morning sun are just right.
Some of my pansies are blooming again; they're so pretty.
Down on the corner a holly bush is breaking out in pretty little crimson berries.
The nice lady who owns the holly bush in question was out walking her dog. He's very friendly. She got him years ago to help her get through the lonliness when her husband died. Now the poor little dog is getting to be arthritic and blind, but he still loves her dearly. Whenever I see her playing with him, I see a magickal transformation: she becomes a little girl again, and he becomes a puppy, and the entire neighborhood becomes an enchanted kingdom that they share.
How could I be depressed when I live in an enchanted kingdom?